The Diameter of the Bomb

I love France.

I’ve been there many times.

In fact, I love it so much, I’d even go as far as calling it my spiritual home.

I posted this poem a couple of years ago after the Boston bombing.

I can’t think of anything more poignant right now, other than to repost it in memory of all the people who lost their lives, not just in Paris, but also in Beirut and Egypt.

 

The Diameter of the Bomb

by Yehuda Amichai

 

The diameter of the bomb was thirty centimeters

And the diameter of its effective range about seven meters,

With four dead and eleven wounded.

And around these, in a larger circle

Of pain and time, two hospitals are scattered

And one graveyard. But the young woman

Who was buried in the city she came from,

At a distance of more than a hundred kilometers,

Enlarges the circle considerably,

And the solitary man mourning her death

At the distant shores of a country far across the sea

Includes the entire world in the circle.

And I won’t even mention the crying of orphans

That reaches up to the throne of God and

Beyond, making

A circle with no end and no God.